How They Were
by SuperRaley
Summary: Someone who Kitty never thought she'd see again interrupts her wedding.


Disclaimer: I don't own the X-men or any of the songs that might have been referenced.

A.N.: Please review! Thanks.

A spunky brunette stood in the front of an altar. She was dressed in a long white, silk gown and her hair was done up in a lacy veil that covered part of her face. She wore a smile as she stared into the eyes of the person facing her.

The man who was standing before her was of the silent type, but he still coveted a smile that expressed his joyous feelings of the special occasion that was to happen today. His short black hair was freshly cut and slicked back. His firm, muscular figure was only semi-hidden by his long black suit and tie.

"Do you Piotr Nikolaievitch Rasputin take Katherine Anne Pryde to be your lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold, to cherish in sickness and in health?" the minister before them asked. The minister himself was furry and blue. He, also, had a thick German accent with each word he pronounced.

"Da," nodded Piotr in his native Russian tongue.

The minister nodded and turned towards the young woman, "Do you Katherine Anne Pryde take Piotr Nikolaievitch Rasputin to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold, to cherish in sickness and in health?"

Kitty smiled, squeezing the bouquet of colorful flowers between her fingers for extra encouragement on the most important decision she'd ever make in her life. All of the other decisions that she had already made in her life were nothing compared to this one. All of the decisions that she had already decided in her short life of twenty years so far were nothing compared to this one. She was about to vow herself to one person forever. She didn't want to make the same mistake that her parents had only realized a couple of years prior when they had divorced after almost twenty years. She was pretty sure that she had come to find the person she would spend the rest of her life with in Piotr. He was everything she had wanted in a man: nice, honest, caring. He also had a since of humor that was all his own. She had never known anyone else to make her so happy. Sure she had been in love once before, but that's when she was a teenager, merely a child. She hadn't known much of what love was, and all that relationship ever seemed to be about was fighting and breaking up. Then, a week or so later getting back together. She wasn't even quite sure what made her go back to her old boyfriend, but it was something that she had never had to do with her soon to be husband. They were always happy. It was constant, no roller coaster of emotions involved. And, that's what she wanted from her life. A happy marriage to a man whom she loved and trusted. Someone to be able to be with for a life time. Someone who wouldn't just decide for the both of them that they were 'taking a break'. Someone who wouldn't just make her feel so angry at times...yet, at other times so passionate. But that was too much a roller coaster for her. She didn't want the ups and downs. That's all her ex was ever really about and that's not what a relationship is about, right?

She found it odd to be thinking about her old boyfriend at a time like this especially since she hadn't thought of him in years. Sure, once upon a time she had thought that maybe it would have been him standing before her, but things change. She'd moved on and found someone new, someone better. Piotr was good for her. After all the persecution she had grown to hear on a regular basis as being a mutant, she needed someone sturdy to lean on. That was her Colossus.

Kitty took a deep breath and nodded. Staring up into her fiancé's eyes, she began, "I..."

The back door to the church burst open and a man staggered in, yelling, "Kitty! Don't do it!"

Everyone, the closest friends and family of both marrying parties, turned and faced the disturbance who had burst through the door and disrupted the most splendid event.

The minister looked out into the crowd and mumbled a low curse as to seeing who it was. The same stumble of curses had already been ricocheted around the church by a number of the guests, namely the friends or teammates of Kitty.

Piotr turned and faced the man. His stone still face's smile slowly turned into a frown as he glared at the man.

Kitty sucked in a quick breath as she kept her eyes focused on her husband to be instead of turning and facing the man who had just ruined her wedding like the rest of the people in the room had done. She had recognized the slurred voice and didn't need to face him as she knew exactly who the man was. She had known him from when she was a teenager. She hadn't seen him in years, but she could never forget his voice. It was the voice of the first person who had ever told her that he loved her, yet months later had ripped her heart out, too. It had been a pattern for him that she had been all to happy to break.

"Kitty!" the man slurred as he staggered further and further into the church, growing closer and closer to the altar with each step he wobbled to. "Please, Kitty, I've got to tell you something..."

Kitty sighed. She slowly turned and faced her ex-boyfriend, "What do you want, Lance?" she raised her voice in aggravation, adding, "Of all days you could get drunk, why today? You're ruining my wedding. I really don't care what you have to say, so just get out!" She pointed to the exit.

Lance shook his head, protesting, "But, Kitty..."

"What!" she shouted. Her face grew red as she noticed her audience was staring at her. Taking a deep breath, she calmly asked, "What is so important, Lance, that you had to interrupt my wedding for?"

Lance put his hand on the corner of a pew of seats and steadied himself to stand up straight. He cleared his throat and proclaimed, "You and me, back in high school, we went round and round. Love and hate was our game, but we sure played it well, a little too well. We'd fight, we'd break up. We'd kiss, we'd make up. We were hot'n cold. We were yes and no. We didn't want to go..."

Kitty's eyes widened as she listened to what he was saying. Her face grew red in anger as she shouted at the intruder, "Are you really quoting Katy Perry in the middle of my wedding?"

Lance just continued his speech, "Kitty, when we broke up, I'd said I'd had enough, but don't think I don't think about it. Don't think I don't have regrets. Don't think it don't get to me between the work and the hurt and the whiskey.."

"Lance!" Kitty scolded, "Enough. Get out of here." She pointed to the exit again. She held back tears from her eyes as her ex continued to ruin her wedding day. He was being the jerk who had broken up with her. Why was he doing this? She wished she had never dated him at all.

"Kitty, I love you. I've always loved you. Why can't you see, he doesn't deserve you," Lance pointed at Piotr, then at himself, "You and me, we're meant to be. You belong with me..."

"I swear, Lance," tears were now pouring down her face, messing up her make-up and making her mascara run. Her hair had begun to get matted against her now moist cheeks, "If you start quoting Taylor Swift, I'm gonna..."

"You can't tell me that you don't still love me," Lance said, "How can you love him, when you still love me." He had slowly started walking as he talked and was now right in front of Kitty and Piotr, "I'll be there in the back of your mind from the day we met in Illinois to the very last night when I walked away with my team instead of being with you. I should have joined the X-men. I would have joined the X-men if I had known it meant loosing you. Kitty, you can't go through with marrying him. You just can't. I was supposed to be standing next to you, not him. He'll never know you like I do. He'll never be able to give you what I gave to you." He paused for a moment, looking up into Kitty's saddened eyes. He really didn't like it when she cried. He looked down at the ground and took a deep breath. Looking back up at her, he continued, "If you do marry him, then...then, it's just too bad cause...cause you've already had the best days of your life...with me."

As Lance proclaimed his speech, Kitty scrunched up her nose remembering all of the bad times she had had with him. Her whole relationship had basically been one bad date after the next. Something had always seemed to go wrong. And, with each date, it usually ended in a big blow up that resulted in the slam of his jeep door and a long hike home from some late night highway back to the mansion.

After all they had been through, after the roller coaster they had called a relationship, she has been happy to end it. Sure, she had been distraught at first. What relationship ends without some shed up tears. Or the need for bowls and bowls of chocolate ice cream. Or a chick flick tear fest, the kind that makes your Goth roommate want to throw your DVD collection through the window if she sees _The Notebook _playing one more time. And, all you want to do is tell her to shut up because no offense, but she can't touch anyone so she has absolutely no idea what breaking up feels like. How it feels like your hearts being ripped out even if you know that it was for the best. And, you know you have no future with them, but it still hurts for what might have been.

Kitty looked at her husband to be and gave him a look, trying to mentally send him a notice that the disruption Lance had caused really needed to be put down. Having picked up on her thoughts, the red head in the front row leaned over to her husband to which he nodded, standing up. He, a tall, muscular brunette wearing red sun glasses, nodded at a short black haired muscular man who grunted, letting go of the white haired goddess next to him's hand. He and the man with the shades walked over towards the drunken Lance and each grabbed a hold of one of his arms.

As they pulled him up the isle towards the exit, Lance began to cry out, "Kitty, I love you...please...I'm asking you not to marry him. I know I should have said something earlier, but...but I'm sorry I didn't. Please, if you ever loved me, have some mercy on me and don't marry him. I still need you, Kitty...Kitty..."

Kitty shook her head. This was her wedding, not his. Why wouldn't he just stop doing this. If he really still loved her like he claimed to then he wouldn't have caused the commotion. This was just one of Lance's episodes of being Lance. Of course, as he kept calling her name, it reminded her of the way he had called her name those few times when it wasn't bad between the two of them. And, when it was good, it was really good. Those few times were sacred, but they were too few, and they were overridden by the bad. Yet, sometimes she couldn't help but think about what might have been. What might have changed if they weren't on opposing teams for so long. What might have happened if they had gotten back together once the Brotherhood had stopped being villains and joined SHIELD's Freedom Force. But that was then and they had taken different roads. They couldn't go back again and there's no way to know what might have been. She'd moved on and she had thought he had, too. Apparently, that hadn't been the case.

"Kitty!" Lance called out as Logan and Scott opened the church doors to throw him out, "Fine." He looked at the two men holding onto him, "I'll go, I'll go, but on one condition. If it's got to be this way, I don't know if it matters but, baby, I guess I'll be okay." Tears actually fell from Lance's face. It was the first time Kitty had ever seen her ex-lover cry. It almost broke her heart in a way. How could what was supposed to be the best day of her life do this to someone who she thought didn't care about her anymore.

"Just if you see me walking by with these tears in my eyes, look away, please just look away. If we're on the streets someday, and I don't know what to say, just look away. Please, Kitty, look away. I don't want you to see me look this way cause... cause I really do still love you," Lance said in one last effort, "I know I wanted us to be over, but this isn't what I wanted us to be. I always wanted us to get back together, but I joined SHIELD and you dated other people...I guess I didn't know a good thing when I had it." He nodded at Scott and Logan, "You can take me out, now."

Kitty stared into the teary eyes of her ex. She surprisingly no longer resented him for ruining her wedding. When he had first burst through the church doors, she had thought that she would never forgive him for doing that, but something he had said had changed her mind. Something about his tears seemed so...real. He acted like the Lance she had fallen in love with once again. He wasn't the Brotherhood bum Lance, but the Lance who had attempted to join the X-men just to be close to her. It was that Lance she loved and maybe now that was the only Lance there. She couldn't be sure, but something about how he had not only got up the nerve to interrupt her wedding when he knew full well she'd probably hate him for it, but also the fact that he had basically given her the okay to get married and move on. It was so mature and...and it was what Kitty had been waiting so long for Lance to become. He had finally grown up and it made her smile.

Kitty glanced over at Piotr and then back down at Lance. Slowly her eyes widened as she found herself doing something she never thought she'd do in a million years.

"Don't!" she yelled as Scott and Logan pulled Lance over the threshold, "Let him go!"

They did as they were told, but joined the crowd with questioning looks and mumbles at Kitty. No one, not even Kitty herself knew quite what she was about to do next.

Tenderly, Kitty turned and kissed Piotr on the cheek, whispering something into his ear that only he could hear. His eyes widened as he gave Kitty a questioning look and then glared at Lance.

Suddenly, Kitty dashed down from the altar and ran towards Lance. All onlookers gasped in surprise.

Kitty had suddenly realized why she had thought about Lance today of all days. It was because she missed screaming and fighting and kissing in the rain. She missed it being two a.m. when she was cursing Lance's name. They had been so in love and were acting the same, but that's the way she loved him.

Jumping up and wrapping her legs around Lance, the two kissed passionately. Everyone else in the church looked on in horror, but Kitty didn't care. She felt sorry for Piotr, but it was just how it had happened. She was just doing what felt natural to her. She was following her instincts. She may have loved Piotr, but she just loved Lance a little more. They were meant to be, flaws and all. It's just how they were.


End file.
